SAN FRANCISCO (AdAge.com) — Google rolled out the most significant change to its search page since the advent of search ads on Wednesday with what it calls "Google Instant." Rather than requiring searchers to hit "enter," results pop up — along with corresponding search ads — as you type in an attempt to predict queries from the very first character.
* P&G, ahead of taking Olay global, names Carrie Underwood as the brand’s first celebrity ambassador.
* Nissan is partnering with Dongfeng Motors on Qi Chen, a new Chinese car brand.
* Oracle’s board rejects shareholder proposal calling for board-level accountability on sustainability.
* AOL taps former William Morris chairman Jim Wiatt as strategic advisor.
* Apple lost 20% of iPhone 4 sales due to “antennagate” (in Minneapolis), while the NYT’s David Pogue reviews 2010 iPods, finds “modest improvements, a risky new design and one home run in the new iPod Touch.”
* CNN makes it official: Piers Morgan will replace Larry King.[more]
* Lilly will invest up to $150 million in venture funds to speed drugs.
* Oracle new hire Mark Hurd is eligible for a $10 million bonus for 2011, on top of his $950,000 salary.
* Vogue.com tests a blend of advertising and editorial content.
New creative in the baby carrots branding push are, tongue in cheek, positioning baby carrots as an aphrodisiac, with three versions of femme fatales. Check out a cybersexy spot and a Lara Croft-like adventuress after the jump.[more]
To be sure, these spots are fun; but will this all boost sales? Weigh in with a comment below.
All those bouncing balls making up Google’s logo over the past couple of days? Turns out they were heralding the search engine giant’s latest advance: Google Instant, which improves its speed and precision with predictive, real-time search results that appear as soon as you type — or as Google puts it, “faster than the speed of type.”
Five years after Yahoo’s instant search launch, Google also released a series of videos (above and after the jump) demonstrating its zippier search capabilities, which the Washington Post’s Rob Pegoraro calls “the next logical extension of the search engine’s ‘auto-complete’ feature.” As for which brands surfaced by letter?[more]
Ad Age ran a test to see which brands popped up first by letter in a New York-based search (results vary geographically); our adds:
And here is Mashable’s Google Instant Search demo for mobile, demonstrated on a Droid 2:
The BP oil disaster may have done serious damage to the profitability of both BP and the Gulf Coast. But one brand profited handsomely from the ordeal: Google.
From Ad Age: “In two months, BP went from spending very little on search advertising — about $57,000 a month — to becoming one of Google’s top advertisers, dropping nearly $3.6 million in the month of June alone… This is a significant outlay, even for BP, which spent $94 million on advertising in 2009, and $78.7 million in the first six months of 2010.”
BP’s Google AdWords spree launched the brand into the ranks of online advertisers that rely on search for a living, including Expedia, Amazon, eBay and Hotels.com. Ad Age combed this information from an internal Google document. So who were the other big Google ad-spending brands?[more]
The publication admits that “the search-spending document obtained by Advertising Age is not a complete list of advertisers on Google.” The documents show that other large brands without a new product launch or a PR crisis (e.g., Walt Disney, Kodak, GM and BMW) spent about $500,000 on search in the same period. During the same period, while BP was spending $3.6 million on it, Exxon Mobil laid out just $43,000 on search.
This data show an incredible reliance on Google search spending when it comes to product launches (AT&T), rebrands (ADT Security), Internet sales and services (Expedia) and brand crisis management.
As for BP, Ad Age comments, “In the wake of the spill, Google was a natural first stop for people seeking information, and BP bought up dozens of keywords associated with the disaster such as ‘oil spill,’ ‘leak,’ ‘top kill’ and ‘live feed’ as it vied for clicks with news stories, images of oiled wildlife and plaintiff attorneys trolling for clients.”
It raises other questions, however. Does major search spending have a greater use in long-term sustained brand building? Or is all that money being sopped up by social media?
As if price-conscious shoppers needed more convincing, a new study published in the October issue of Consumer Reports magazine states “store brand products can compete with their name-brand counterparts and save shoppers more than a thousand dollars a year on grocery bills.” According to Tod Marks, senior projects editor for the magazine, “The study reaffirms that store brands are worth a try.”
Five supermarket chains were evaluated and prices for private-label or store-brand vs name-brand items were compared for 30 everyday items. Consumer Reports found the average savings with store brands was 30%, while its researchers found nutrition similar for most of the tested products.
Yet, shoppers need coaxing to trust some store brands — many, ironically, created by big name brands.[more]
“Although they’ll snap up store-brand paper goods and plastics, at least half of our survey respondents rarely or never buy store-brand wine, pet food, soda, or soup,” Consumer Reports noted. “That may be especially true when the category includes a name-brand superstar such as Coca-Cola or Campbell’s.”
Store brands have grown in popularity during the recent recession. Some 84% of U.S. shoppers bought store brands in the past year, and 93 percent of those who purchased store brands said they would keep buying them even after the economy recovers. Nationally, almost one in four products sold in supermarkets are store brands, accounting for a record $55.5 billion in sales last year, according to Consumer Reports.
As for taste, national brands still edged out store brands, but not by much. Consumer Reports tested 21 brands in head-to-head taste match-ups. The national brands won seven times, the store brand beat out the national brand three times, and the remaining eleven tests resulted in ties. Hellmann’s mayonnaise topped Jewel, Land O’ Lakes butter beat Wegman’s, and Bumble Bee tuna trounced Target’s Market Pantry. But Food Lion’s Lotsa Noodles soup was preferred over Campbell’s Chicken Noodle, Publix Premium orange juice bested Tropicana, and A&P brand America’s Choice hot dogs beat out Oscar Meyer.
Consumer Reports noted that some store brands are actually manufactured by companies that also make nationally-recognized brands, accounting for similar quality. The magazine also said that the price difference between store brands and national brands may be narrowing because national brands have found it necessary to lower their prices or make promotional offers to remain competitive.
Based on its survey, CR concludes that “there’s no reason store brands shouldn’t hold their own against the big boys. After all, some of the same companies manufacture both. Among the big names that also make store-brand products: Sara Lee (baked goods), Reynolds (wraps, storage containers), 4C (bread crumbs, iced tea, soup mixes), McCormick (seasonings, extracts, sauces, gravies), Feit (lightbulbs), Manischewitz (frozen appetizers, soup mixes, side dishes), Joy Cone (ice cream cones), Stonewall Kitchen (gourmet condiments, specialty foods), and Royal Oak (charcoal).”
Interestingly, two examples of a different type of store brand—”second tier” brands, which may cost even less—fared worse in CR test, and indicate one category that may not stick with price-conscious consumers: the second-tier Kroger Value Sandwich Singles Imitation Pasteurized Process Cheese Food and Albertsons-purchased Shoppers Value creamy peanut butter.
What happens when you type one letter into Google's revamped search engine?
Timberland’s latest campaign extends its Earthkeepers eco-friendly collection, which last year partnered with Wyclef Jean as the brand’s designated “Earthkeeper hero” for his Haiti relief efforts, even collaborating on a limited collection to celebrate the partnership.
The popular footwear brand is hoping others will want to be Earthkeeper heroes, too, and make a lighter carbon footprint by adopting its eco-friendly products and ethos.[more]
Its new “Lost Bottle” TV commercial above, augments Earthkeepers’ eco values, which have been fostered via an online community, a “Virtual Forest” Facebook app encouraging users to create personal heroic moments, and a related microsite with 3D technology. Visitors can freeze-frame moments on-screen at a 360-degree angle, and create a forest or join a friend’s. For each use, Timberland vowed to plant trees in Haiti to supplement its reforestation project.
As part of its Nature Needs Heroes Earthkeepers brand extension this fall, select Timberland store windows in the U.S. are adding interactive, oversize graphics which come-to-life with 3D glasses dispensed to customers in-store.
In-store POS displays also X-ray a 2.0 Earthkeeper boot to show recycled contents. Every pair of Earthkeepers boots includes recycled rubber and recycled PET, with one and a half plastic bottles used in each pair.
According to Mintel, more than 35% of American consumers say they are willing to pay a higher price for environmentally-friendly products.
“We’re finding that consumers are being drawn to the styling and performance of the new Earthkeepers collection, but it’s also the most environmentally-innovative collection of products we’ve ever launched,” said Jim Davey, Timberland’s VP, global marketing. “Great products that happen to be more sustainable makes for a great story.”
Creative director Mads Holst added, “The Nature Needs Heroes campaign is the first time a major brand blends this combination of leading-edge technologies to challenge the way audiences can experience a story.”
The big question: do consumers want to be challenged and become “heroes,” and consume more (even if they are eco-friendly) products in order to change?